Commercial real estate | Greater Montreal: lack of industrial premises and laboratories

While the number of square feet of office space offered continues to increase in Greater Montreal, industrial premises and laboratories are snapped up. Overview.

Martine Letarte
special cooperation

The first quarter of 2022 ended with a 16.1% office vacancy rate in Montreal and its suburbs. At the corresponding period in 2020, this rate was 9.5%, according to statistics compiled by the commercial real estate services firm CBRE.

Class A buildings, the most upscale, fare better than Class B buildings, which offer fewer services, according to Jeremy Kenemy, vice president at CBRE, whose team works with companies that need to rent premises.

“Beautiful, quality spaces with a turnkey service are still in demand because company management who find it important to bring their employees back to the office have understood that, to achieve this, they must make them want to come back”, explains- he.

We are thinking in particular of buildings that have spaces for parking bicycles and showers for employees who, for example, want to jog at lunchtime.

Current projects

Also, don’t underestimate all the buildings under construction that will add square footage to the supply. In the Longueuil agglomeration, which also includes the cities of Boucherville, Brossard, Saint-Lambert and Saint-Bruno-de-Montarville, there is the Solar Uniquartier connected to the Réseau express métropolitain (REM) Du Quartier station. The first phase of 150,000 sq.² is 90% leased, while the second, with its 250,000 sq.² of offices, is under construction.

The Panama project, linked to the REM station of the same name, will have 500,000 sq.² of offices. Then, downtown Longueuil, around the metro, will add more than 1 million square feet to the market for offices.

“Real living environments are developing around these public transit hubs with residential spaces, retail businesses, entertainment venues and offices that are suitable for many Montreal businesses and institutions that want a pied-à-terre in the suburbs to eliminate the need to cross bridges,” says Julie Ethier, Director General of Economic Development for the Longueuil Agglomeration (DEL).

Many businesses also find that they are now renting too many square feet for their needs and are deciding to sublet some. CBRE estimates that there is currently just over 2 million square feet available for sublease in Greater Montreal, which represents just over 17% of the available space, more than double compared to 2020. .

We’re tearing up laboratories and industrial spaces

If the supply of offices is massive, spaces to set up research and development laboratories are much more difficult to find. Jeremy Kenemy’s team is very active in the field and points out that the spaces are practically all occupied in the Cité de la Biotech in Laval, the Technoparc Montreal, the Nexus 40-13, the Royalmount and downtown Montreal.

“Many space owners are therefore partnering with architectural and engineering firms specializing in the construction of turnkey laboratory spaces to provide businesses with the new square footage they need,” notes Jeremy Kenemy.

Industrial premises are also highly sought after. “We no longer have land for sale in our industrial parks, but some have space for rent, especially in Saint-Bruno and Longueuil,” says Julie Ethier. Some landlords have not yet built their buildings, so it is possible to adapt them to the specific needs of new tenants. »